


Suck It Up

by kjack89



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Injury, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-17
Updated: 2014-07-17
Packaged: 2018-02-09 06:56:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1973211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kjack89/pseuds/kjack89
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Joly is injured and just wants a little sympathy (and finds it from an unlikely source).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Suck It Up

**Author's Note:**

> Entirely self-indulgent, as I injured two of my fingers recently and was not receiving what I deemed the proper amount of sympathy from people in real life (people online were _significantly_ more supportive, and I love them for it).
> 
> Usual disclaimer. Please be kind and tip your fanfic writers in the form of comments and/or kudos!

See, the problem with having a boyfriend who was in many ways a walking disaster was that his sympathy levels were not overwhelmingly high. It wasn’t like Bossuet was a dick about it, just that since he had spent so much time in the hospital or the emergency room or urgent care — he wasn’t clumsy, not by any means, he or one of his appendages always just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time — that it was difficult for him to work up the proper levels of caring whenever Joly encountered a minor ailment.

Such as right now, when Joly returned home from work with a scowl, cradling his splinted finger and pouting at Bossuet, who looked unimpressed. “What’d you do to yourself?”

Joly held up his finger. “Sprained it,” he said sadly. “Doctor has ordered immobilization — hence the splint — and rest and ice.”

“Doctor or WebMD?” Bossuet sniggered, though he quickly sobered with Joly’s scowl deepened. “I’m very sorry to hear that. Do you want me to kiss it to make it better?”

Though Joly let him kiss it, he still wasn’t feeling the proper level of sympathy that he had hoped for. Not that a sprained finger was a particularly worrisome injury, but still. He had hoped for maybe a hug and some cuddling, or perhaps Bossuet to ask him how the injury had happened (which was actually a  _really_  boring story — Joly had been reaching out to open a door and someone had opened it from the opposite direction into his hand). Really, it was a Bossuet-style injury which perhaps explained Bossuet’s lack of sympathy, even though Joly normally fussed over Bossuet’s even more mild maladies.

Since Joly was clearly not going to find the reaction he desired, he decided to head to the Musain a few hours early that night in hopes of eliciting the sympathy of his fellow Amis. The first two he ran into were Bahorel and Feuilly, who were pregaming at the main bar before heading into the backroom. “What did you do to your hand?” Bahorel asked with a raised eyebrow.

Joly sighed heavily. “Sprained my finger at work,” he said bracingly.

Bahorel snorted. “Oh, that’s nothing,” he scoffed. “You should have seen what I did to my fingers the last time I got in a bar fight. I think I still have the scar on my knuckle from where I cut it on this guy’s lip ring.” He twisted his hand around to show Joly the scar in question, grinning savagely as he did.

Feuilly, however, had other concerns, his brow furrowed as he peered at Joly. “You got hurt at work?” he asked seriously. “Did you report it to your supervisor? You may be entitled to workers compensation if you’ve reported it properly, especially if you have to miss work.”

Joly blushed and looked away as he mumbled, “It’s really not that big of a deal. I’m not going to miss work over it. It’ll probably be fine by Monday.”

“What’ll be fine by Monday?” Combeferre asked, leaning against the bar as he waited for his usual drink to be made.

Joly blushed even further. “Just my finger,” he muttered, waving the offending digit. “I sprained it.”

“Did you get it x-rayed?” Combeferre asked, more curious than anything. “You know there can be ligament damage in the case of a sprain. Did I ever tell you about this article that I was reading on ligament damage in cats, because it was really interesting and possibly relevant?”

He looked so eager that Joly almost felt bad as he shook his head and said quickly, “Some other time. I forgot I said I’d meet Grantaire inside.”

Of course, now he didn’t have anything to do but go into the backroom in search of Grantaire who, predictably, was half a bottle of wine deep already, though he hadn’t yet sunk into that particular brand of melancholy that concerned Joly, and Joly wondered if he might yet be able to elicit some sympathy. “What’s this?” Grantaire asked as Joly approached. “An injured comrade? We can’t have that!”

“It’s fine,” Joly lied, leaning heavily against Grantaire’s table. “Just a sprained finger.”

“Will it stop you from holding a glass?” Grantaire asked seriously. “Because alcohol is the  _best_  way to dull the pain.” He winked at Joly and added in a loud whisper, “I would know.”

From his seat next to Grantaire, Jehan scoffed, “Alcohol is all well and good, but the true way to ease pain is with some fine nature-made pharmaceuticals.” He leaned forward and regarded Joly carefully. “Can I interest you in some opium? It’s great stuff and would totally take the edge off. Or pot, if that’s more your thing.”

It wasn’t like Joly hadn’t indulged with Jehan before, and he wasn’t really phased at the offer of illicit drugs (he was a big supporter of legalized marijuana, at the very least medicinally, but preferably for recreational purposes as well), but he thought opium for a minor sprain probably wasn’t necessary. “Uh, I think I’ll stick with ibuprofen, thanks.”

“Stick with ibuprofen?” Courfeyrac said loudly, plopping into the seat next to Grantaire and giving him a giant kiss on the cheek, which Grantaire wrinkled his nose at and shoved Courfeyrac away. “You always told us to use ibuprofen for a hangover, Jolllly, so I hope you’re not changing your own medical advice now.”

Joly rolled his eyes, but the doctor in him couldn’t help but say, “Well, it doesn’t have to be ibuprofen, per se, but you definitely want to avoid acetaminophen since it can put undue stress on your liver, but that’s not really the point. I’m sticking with an anti-inflammatory for my finger.”

He held up his hand and Courfeyrac’s eyes widened. “That’s looks rough. And you’re not even going to drink to take the edge off?”

“Well, I didn’t say that—” Joly started, but Grantaire interrupted, lifting his wine glass.

“Let’s all pour one out for Joly’s finger.”

“Absolutely,” Courfeyrac said instantly, hoisting his own glass. “But by ‘pour one out’, I hope you secretly mean ‘pour one down our throats’ because, uh, party foul.”

Grantaire gave him a look. “Dude. It’s me. What do you  _think_  I meant?”

All three of them started laughing, and Joly slowly backed away from them, feeling himself start to pout again. He drifted over to where Enjolras was working on something and generally ignoring the entire lot of their friends and sat down sullenly at the table.

He had just wanted someone to sympathize with him, someone to tell him that it sucked that he had injured himself and maybe offer to buy him a beer or something. But no, that was too much for his friends.

He could feel his thoughts turning bitter, but he couldn’t seem to stop them, even as Enjolras slowly looked up at him, blinking as his eyes refocused on Joly rather than his computer screen. “What’s wrong?” he asked, frowning slightly.

“It’s nothing,” Joly mumbled, looking down at the table. “You don’t want to hear about it.”

Enjolras raised an eyebrow at Joly as he took a sip of coffee. “Well, clearly it’s not nothing, if you’re concerned about it. And it’s not like I’m doing anything vital at the moment.” Joly looked pointedly at Enjolras’s computer and the stack of paper next to it, and Enjolras shrugged and amended, “I’m not doing anything vital that I actually  _want_  to be doing. So why don’t you tell me what’s wrong.”

Joly shrugged, but told Enjolras all about his finger. The entire time, Enjolras listened quietly, occasionally responding with a sympathetic wince when merited. At the end, he nodded his head slowly and asked carefully, “Do you need me to get anything for you? Ibuprofen, or ice for your finger?”

Almost in spite of himself, Joly smiled slightly. “Actually, believe it or not, it’s not feeling too badly right now.” He cocked his head as he looked at Enjolras. “I was actually kind of expecting you to tell me to suck it up.”

Enjolras laughed lightly and shook his head. “In case you’ve forgotten, you sat by my bed for three days straight when I got shot at that protest,” he reminded Joly. “Not to mention when we all got the stomach flu at university and you nursed all eight of us through it despite being sick yourself. Or any of the other times you’ve helped us when we’ve been sick or injured. The least I could do is sit here and let you vent, since there’s not much else I can do to help.”

Joly blinked and shook his head. “That’s…remarkably nice of you. Thanks.” He hesitated, almost as if he wanted to say something else, then shook his head. “Well, now that I’ve gotten my fair share of sympathy, I’m going to go drink it off with Bossuet and Grantaire.”

“Probably a good plan,” Enjolras said, turning back to his computer as Joly stood up. “Oh, and Joly?” Joly glanced back at him, and Enjolras smirked. “Suck it up.”

Grinning, Joly saluted. “I will try my hardest.” He turned and left, still smiling, and felt that somehow, his finger didn’t hurt quite so badly.


End file.
